Hello everyone! Sorry for the long gap between our blog posts – we’ve had a very busy month here at Selamatkan Yaki, what with Guide Training and Torang Bacirita discussion in a row. Stay with us, we’ll update you with exciting news about those events very soon! Before we jump into those events, we’d like to introduce a member of our team, Ruth Papente. She has been helping since joined the survey team. Let’s read what Ruth has to say about the surveys.

Hello, I am Ruth one of the five surveyors for EARS. I’m really glad to join this team. We thank God for the good time as I got to meet new friends with different ages, basics, and characters though all of us could find a harmony which makes the team solid and close.

Education and Awareness is an important goal of the Selamatkan Yaki Programme. Socialization and campaign to the society are needed to increase the support of conservation. But before starting those activities, it is a must that we need to know about people’s background, attitudes and behaviours. We find the baseline by doing a survey after which we can carry out our Education and Awareness Raising action plan.

The baseline data collection was held in two different places, Langowan village and Tomohon City with more than 781 respondents in eight villages. One of the reasons why we did the survey in these areas is because there are bushmeat markets with a high level trade in each of these places. Results of previous research have shown high level of consumption of bushmeats including yaki. The information we have got will be later compared to the upcoming survey information after the impact of our campaign in the community.

It’s challenging when we must find and meet new people, asking them if they would like to be interviewed, interact with them, and creating a good mood to answer the questions in the questionnaire. It sounds easy but it is actually not. As time passed, we got more used to it, and we started to enjoy being able to control the atmosphere of our interviews.

First of all we had a workshop in the office, then three pilot days in three different villages, which are: Bulo (Tateli) , Kumelembuai (Tomohon), and Kayawu (Tomohon). This was meant to warm us up before collecting the actual data. Then we started to do the surveys in Langowan and Tomohon. In Langowan we had to survey four villages. They are: Noongan, Noongan III, Kawatak, and Walantakan. For Tomohon we have: Tara-tara I, Walian, Talete II , and Kakaskasen I.

We finished the Langowan surveys in one month. There were so many stories and so many things happened in this location. We got to meet respondents in many characters and attitudes; sometimes they received us with big smile, others with a suspicious look, and sometimes they refuse to be our respondent. Then we must find their replacement, like other people in the house or their neighbors. But overall, the people who did agree to be our respondents answered questions quite freely, and things went more or less smoothly. Surveys in Tomohon were a little bit harder than Langowan. It’s because Tomohon is a new developing city, where the citizens were busier and more indifferent. It was interesting to see similarities and also differences in people’s opinions between Langowan and Tomohon, according to the differences between the citizens’ daily activities and basic cultures.

All surveys went well, we thank God for this precious time with hard work and patience of the team. And of course, big thanks to all repondents in Tomohon and Langowan. Thank you for the honest answers, opinions and suggestions. Thank you for all the kindness, may God bless you all.